Sunday, 10 September 2017

Our next meeting is a return to the familiar and much loved territory of St Mary's Episcopal Cathedral in Glasgow, where our Musical Director Frikki Walker is Director of Music and where a fair number of our singers are in the Cathedral Choir, to sing Choral Evensong at 4pm on Saturday 7th October 2017.

While the venue is very familiar to us, this will be a first for RSCM Scottish Voices since because of the recent departure to Ely of our now former Assistant Musical Director Richard Walmsley and the non-availability on this occasion of our Musical Director Frikki Walker, we will be directed and accompanied by James Kealey and Christopher Nickol respectively, the very first time that any of our meetings hasn't featured either (or more usually both) Frikki or Richard.

We are of course in safe hands, we wouldn't be so foolish as to experiment wildly.

James has recently moved to Glasgow from Somerset where he was Senior Organ Scholar and Second Assistant at Wells Cathedral (where Frikki was previously a Vicar Choral in the choir at the same time that Richard was a Treble in the choir, small world, isn't it?) and he has taken up the position of Director of Choral Music at St Aloysius' College in Glasgow (coincidentally replacing Keith Roberts who until he moved south a few weeks ago sang countertenor in the choir of St Mary's Episcopal Cathedral under Frikki).

Christopher Nickol is quite simply legendary in choral and organ circles in Glasgow, famous for his undoubted organ playing skill but also for his party piece of being able to play anything you care to name, instantly, and without the need for music. Born in Cambridge, he was a music scholar at Ampleforth College, Organ Scholar at Royal Holloway College (University of London), and postgraduate scholar at the Royal College of Music, and is currently Director of Music at New Kilpatrick Church in Bearsden, staff pianist and organist at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, pianist at the Dance School of Scotland, accompanist of Bearsden Choir, and a regular deputy organist at both Glasgow Cathedral and Glasgow University. Christopher has performed as an organist and soloist with the BBC SSO, Caledonian Voices, Glasgow Cathedral Choir & Choral Society, Glasgow Chamber Choir, the National Youth Choir of Scotland, the RCS Chamber Choir, the RSNO and RSNO Chorus, and the choir of St Mary's Episcopal Cathedral in Glasgow. He has given over 500 concerts on the organ in Kelvingrove Museum and Art Gallery in Glasgow, including one that went viral on social media on the day that the death was announced of David Bowie when, without any printed music, he played Life on Mars and a mobile phone video recording of it has been viewed on Facebook alone almost 2 million times. It's well worth a watch/listen and it can be found at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-35292054
or a shorter clip on Youtube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SsAYfEQMGkk

The music list for the next 12 months has just today been finalised and announced, and we're really looking forward to a lovely balance of revisiting some previously performed classics and learning pieces we've never sung before. Please do come along to any of the services if you're in the area.

All of it is contained on our "future services and events" page on this site, but is reproduced below.

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RSCM Scottish Voices

Since 2009 RSCM Scottish Voices has been a self-financing adult choir that aims to draw together some of the most accomplished and experienced church musicians in Scotland to sing services six times a year in a variety of abbeys, cathedrals and prominent churches around the country, in addition to taking part in a very sociable annual summer residential rehearsal weekend.

Joining the choir

We occasionally have vacancies for singers, so if you are aged 18 or over, are resident in Scotland, have experience in church choral singing, and would like to be considered for an audition or would just like more information, please contact administrator@rscmscottishvoices.org.uk for an application form, stating your voice part and giving a little detail of your choral experience.

Subscriptions

The Annual Subscription for RSCM Scottish Voices is £40 per year, plus a £10 fee payable on the day at each event. There may be some limited scope for subsidising those in full time education who could not otherwise afford to join - please contact the administrator for further details. The cost of the residential rehearsal weekend depends on the venue.